Twitter did the same with Mastodon links originally.
I don’t like subscriptions at all because I’m very conscious that one day I may not be able to afford to subscribe and I’ll lose access / data etc. So I will simply not use apps that require an ongoing subscription where my data is difficult to move. If they allow me to buy a lifetime license, I’m in.
I am happy to donate or make a monthly payment, knowing that if I stop I can still access it. So Obsidian works for me - I donate but the data is local and mine so if anything happens it’s still there. Archive.org I donate too - if I don’t pay I can still use it.
The other consideration I have is where is my data and what are they doing with it. For example, I host my email with Fastmail. It’s a yearly subscription but the data is mine and I can move it where I want and I trust the company credentials on not mining my data.
I wouldn’t pay Reddit or Facebook. Whatever you pay they’re still horrendous corporations that you are the product for.
I will easily pay $2 or $3 a month for something I use. The more I use it and it makes my life easier, the more I’ll pay. $2 is a no brainer to pay. More takes consideration.
We’ll come back in the future and hail you as a visionary.
While I broadly agree with you, don’t discount Windows so easily. It’s not finished by any means.
Organizations have a massive investment in Windows and the Windows ecosystem that they cannot or cannot easily replace with Linux. The organizational user base dwarfs the home user base (no stats, just my opinion and experience).
For the technical minded user, Linux makes a lot of sense. For gamers, I still think there is that ‘Windows is best’ mindset (that is being chipped away at but it’s still present - NVIDIA getting on board would help). For small businesses Linux makes sense. For large businesses, cost aside, it doesn’t fit for reasons I mentioned above.
Obviously that is a large generalisation, but, again based on experience, I think it holds generally true.
All of this from a home user and gamer who switched to Manjaro in January and has booted his Windows machine twice since then, only to grab files off of.